Courses/Lectures
Each of the 34 courses available can be enrolled in individually, or in packages. Each course is an approximately 1-hour session that consists of the opportunity for the students to interact with the associated artifacts, and a discussion exercise tailored for your specific class in accordance with your teacher's curriculum/recommendations. If the Course List below doesn’t fit your needs, we can work together to develop the presentation you desire – from control of the discussion topics to selection of items to be presented.
The Business of Slavery
This course examines the financial and legal side of slavery, as a way of understanding the dehumanizing of the slave. Reviewing these artifacts, students will gain a better understanding of the devastating effects these business decisions could have on slaves and their families – as well as the financial impact slave ownership had for the slave master.
Artifacts: Slave Want Ads, Property Tax Receipts, slave schedules, will transferring ownership of slaves, slave bill of sale, other relevant documents.
19th Century Slave Tags (reproductions)- When used to capture a runaway slave, the blade end would be driven into the ground, tree or other solid surface with the other end shackle to the slave. This would keep the runaway stationary, allow the slave catcher to pursue other runaways, and return to pick up the captured slave later. When used for punishment, up to four of these could be used to bind each hand and ankle with the blades being driven into the ground, leaving the slave face down spread out on the ground (a technique known as quartering) where they can be whipped and left in the sun indefinitely.
18th Century Runaway Slave Ad - Runaway slave ads were commonplace in newspapers through the entire United States, during period of slavery. In addition to having to elude capture during their inital escape, former slaves also had to be cautious of individuals seeking to cashi-in on published rewards for returning them back to bondage. The example here is from January, 1792.